Soft Case (Book 1 of the John Keegan Mystery Series)

by John Misak

ass, and I was less than concerned about their support.

  I wanted to run into Agnelli there, meet him eye to eye and see what he was all about. I might have even spit in his face if I had another scotch in me. Lucky for him, he wasn’t there.

  I walked into Geiger’s office, and he raised his eyebrows when he saw me. As usual, he was on the phone. He rushed the other person off the line, then smiled at me sympathetically.

  “What a night, huh John?”

  “You could say that.”

  “I’m happy you came in. I’ve wanted to talk to you.”

  “About what?”

  “You know.”

  I didn’t.

  “This is all Agnelli,” he said.

  “You mean what happened last night?”

  Geiger got up and closed the door to his office. He came back around and sat on the edge of his desk. “Yes, last night. Something’s brewing here, and I can’t put my finger on it.”

  I wanted to tell him to put his finger up it so it could join his thumb. I wished my father hadn’t said what he had about Geiger. I really wanted to trust Geiger because he was one of the few men that I trusted on a day-to-day basis.

  “What do you think might be going on?”

  “Agnelli and Chapman. I think they are in cahoots together. I think they have been in some sort of deranged partnership from the beginning, and that Agnelli knew Mullins was going to get bumped off.”

  “Sounds sort of like a movie plot, don’t you think?”

  Geiger laughed. “Yeah, maybe. Or the plot of a good novel.”

  “Wouldn’t know anything about novels. Don’t read. Certainly don’t write,” I said. Really, I don’t.

  “It’s nice to see your sense of humor hasn’t left you in the middle of all of this.”

  “It’s fading fast.”

  “You know that you’ll beat this rap and be back on the job soon, right?” Geiger asked. I didn’t believe it.

  “Yeah, if I admit that I was suckered in by Sondra Mullins and that I think she was the one who killed her husband.”

  “You don’t think that’s the case.”

  “I don’t know what’s the case is. I was thinking of just taking everyone involved, throwing them in a room, and then lighting the place on fire,” I said.

  Geiger didn’t laugh at that. Damn the timing. “You wanna fry me too?”

  “Fry everybody. Why not?”

  “Thanks.”

  “Don’t mention it.”

  “But seriously, you don’t have to finger Mrs. Mullins.” I held off on a wisecrack on that one. I have some restraint. “You have to get at Agnelli, and I am more than willing to help you do that. All we have to do is find the link between him and Chapman, and we’ll have all we need. You’ll be back to your normal life, and we can end this whole thing with Agnelli. You can’t even imagine how much better this place would run if he was out.”

  “You’ve suspected him of being dirty for this long and didn’t do anything about it?”

  “I couldn’t. I never had anything solid. After what he did to you, it just became too obvious,” Geiger said.

  Maybe it had. I knew that Geiger had a vendetta against Agnelli from the start, but I never thought it ran that deep. I didn’t even want to think of how much trouble I was headed for if Geiger was the one who was dirty.

  “Okay. So what do we do?”

  “That all depends on you.”

  “I’m listening.” As soon as I finished that word, someone knocked on the door.

  “What?” Geiger asked.

  “You’ve got the Commissioner on line two,” a man said. It sounded like Peters. I thought about taking my reserve gun out and blasting him right through the door. Then again, if I was wrong, I’d pull a Hamlet, to make a literary reference. Okay, so I read. But I don’t want anyone knowing that.

  “I’ve got to take this call, John. Do me a favor and lay low for the rest of the day. We’ll get to work tomorrow.”

  “Yeah, no problem.”

  Of course I wasn’t going to lay low. I was on fire, and I wanted to gather as much information as possible. I wasn’t going to tell any of the people who said they were going to help me about each other, and see who delivered. I knew my uncle would come through, Rick would try, and I hoped Geiger would as well. I thought he would. Well, he seemed like he wanted to help. I guess I should just leave it at that.

  I slept horribly that night, reminding me of the short time I lived with my ex-girlfriend. I never slept when she was in the bed. She gave off too much heat. I felt hot that night as well, and was afraid to open my eyes the next morning, for fear that she would be snuggled up next to me. That would have been a nightmare. Luckily, when I did open my eyes, I was alone in bed the way I like it.

  My head felt fuzzy, not an abnormal occurrence, and my stomach was a bit queasy. It was like a huge hangover, what I was feeling, but I hadn’t drank enough to warrant that. It was my mind, I knew that, and I was pissed off that I’d let what was going on get to me. I’d normally let things slide off me, basically because I didn’t care enough to let them bother me. This was different of course, but in the back of my mind I knew things would somehow work out. I might sound like the epitome of a pessimist, but I always had faith that things would end up okay. You might even say that I was an optimist. I’d say that I think the glass has water in it; I don’t give a damn if it is half empty or half full.

  I wanted to jump right into what I wanted to do. It might help if you know what that is. You see, I knew someone was behind all of this, and I had become certain that Mullins didn’t commit suicide. I had my doubts earlier in the investigation, but at this time, I was sure. Someone had killed him, and more than one person had a lot to gain from his death. Which one of them was the culprit? I knew Chapman had something to do with it. He just seemed too seedy to me to not have something to do with it. Sure, he might not have had a lot to gain with the will and all that, but he did have an angle. He was the one I wanted to find more out about. Then, I had Sondra to consider. I didn’t want to consider her, but I really didn’t have a choice. I found her attractive, without question, but attractive women did me more harm than good in my life. I had to believe she was most likely going to continue that trend. She had a lot to gain from the death of her husband, possibly more than anyone else. She also had the most to lose by the death being a suicide, so that worked in her favor too. I also had Steve to think about, the ever-friendly security guard who made me suspicious every time I spoke to him. Then there was a long list of employees, all of whom I didn’t suspect with any real conviction, which made all of them even more suspicious. It was always the one you thought of last.

  Which brought me to myself. No, of course I didn’t kill Mullins, but if he were alive right then, I would have, for all the trouble he’d indirectly caused me. My life had been thrown upside down, and though I tried to keep a positive perspective, I really couldn’t see a way out of the situation I was in. One solution was to drink my way out of it, a solution I had used several times before, but I didn’t really feel like drinking so early in the morning. Nothing good ever comes from that.

  So, here was my plan. I was going to get whatever equipment Uncle Paulie could supply me, and keep an eye on Chapman and Sondra, to see if either one of them did anything that would point me in the right direction. I probably was going to come up empty, but I had to do something. It didn’t seem like the department was going to investigate the case any further, and my future there was uncertain at best. I didn’t care. I figured my career was over. With a suspension on my record, and an ugly departure coming, my future in law enforcement didn’t seem so bright.

  I got dressed, and walked into the kitchen. I had nothing to eat, which wasn’t much of a surprise. I couldn’t remember the last time I went food shopping. Probably over a month, at least. Thankfully, I had cigarettes, so I lit one, and stood in the kitchen, waiting for something to happen.

  Nothing did.

  I guess
I shouldn’t have expected the phone to start ringing off the hook. Uncle Paulie had his hands full, and he would probably deliver for me on Monday. Geiger was off, and Rick was busy pretending like he was sick. So, instead of waiting around any longer for something to happen, I went downstairs to the garage, and got into Mom’s Cadillac. Destination unknown.

  Eighteen

  I headed out to Long Island, if only to take a leisurely drive. There’s nowhere to do such a thing in Manhattan, and I thought maybe I would stop by my parents’ house for a little parental comfort. There were no answers there, but at least I could escape from my problems for a little while.

  On the way there, I changed my mind. As nice as it would have been to eat a good meal and talk to the family, it wasn’t going to do me any real good. I needed to clear a few things up first, and the only way to do that was to go see Sondra. I didn’t know what I was going to find, but I figured I might be able to get something out of her. If I could rule her out as a suspect, which was a long shot at best, I could then focus everything on Chapman. Maybe she knew something that could point me in that direction.

  I knew right then that I would have to play hardball.

  It took me almost an hour in Saturday traffic to get to Massapequa. Every asshole with a driver’s license was on the Southern State Parkway, and most likely a few others without a license. I couldn’t stand it. It wasn’t a particularly nice day, and I couldn’t fathom a reason why the parkway would be so jammed on a